The Bird House – by Oyindamola Adedipe

The Bird HouseSome people might not have noticed Twitter’s likeness to birds. The logo is a bird, the home icon is a bird house, a bird ‘tweets’ and the ‘compose new tweet’ button is a feather or a quill. This realization has led me to develop a metaphor for the whole Twitterverse.

Twitter is like a gigantic bird house hosting a never ending party which every bird in the world is allowed to attend. The birds are allowed to choose whether to put on a mask or not. Almost everybody is talking at the same time; some are listening while a whole lot of others are just hearing. Some birds are very loud and even when the birds at the back do not hear what they are saying; the crowd can always just repeat the words.

There are private rooms to which each bird has its own key and sometimes you need to ask permission from a bird to be able to go in. Some birds go into other birds’ private rooms and wait for hours but the owner of the room won’t show while some birds jump from one room to another and are always entertained by the hosts. The masked birds are usually easier to talk to because of their lack of identity; they are either very quiet or very loud.

Some birds are in one corner arguing about jollof rice, others about soccer, some are talking to themselves, others are talking to all. All some of the birds do is sing, while others just act in a play because so much drama.

The best part about the bird house besides the fact that you meet so many birds is that you can always go outside, take off your mask and fly away.